A Social, Social Network

Software defined human relationships are weak. They are persistent, but because of that, we become complacent and don’t work on the actual interpersonal relationship – the persistance of the software link removes the fear of losing contact.

Simultaneously, people almost always post on social media for themselves – reactions, upvotes, humble bragging, “I agree”, “I can relate”, or “I want you to hear my opinion / care about what I say”. While not amoral, we should encourage sharing when it counts – true charitable causes with tangible results such as Humans of New York.

Because of this, I propose a social network that encourages relationships and discourages narcissism through the following1:

Connections:

1. You may have up to 30 connections.
2. Any connection is automatically archived after 3 months since the last meaningful communication with each connection.
3. Meaningful communication is defined as:
   • An instant messaging conversation with at least 7 messages within a day.
   • A wifi match / bluetooth pairing / NFC bump of your phones with your connections.
4. You will be prompted to communicate at 2 weeks, 1 month, 2 months, and the week before your connection is archived.
5. You can revive connections from your connection archive.

Wall:

1. There will not be any scrolling feed.
2. There will be a board that allows a maximum of 20 minutes viewing per day.

Replies:

1. No reactions. Comment or don’t.
2. Should they allow it, you may send a message to the other person. For example if you want to help their cause.

Ads:

1. None.

Perhaps then we’ll actually connect.

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1 numbers can be tweaked

Retrospect 2017

This year my routine was not very different to last year — so the first half of the year was not super exciting, except for perhaps when the next door neighbour’s fence fell over:



However, within that routine, I did a few different things, like finally contribute to open source repositories:



In the second half of the year, I was given a rare opportunity — a business trip to Europe with expenses covered by my workplace, Orion Health. Out of habit, I did a quick analysis of the pros/cons of whether I should take it, or not.



In the end I went, and learnt to make tea and take photos. In comparison with last year, this trip did alter my routine to allocate more time for chores, and introduced Spanish and Exploration as new activities.

And it was good.